Around the Edges
by NGBlue
Summary: Very short reflection piece. B'Elanna's not in a happy place.


Title: Around the edges

Author: NGBlue

Summary: Not worth it...short reflection piece.

Disclaimer: not mine, not making money etc.

Note: this was posted on the VJB boards ages ago. I'm still in the process of uploading all the finished stories to FF before trying to get my own site back up again. Also cheers for the feedback people gave me.

-x-x-x-

I've been thinking about her, been doing that a lot lately. Perhaps if I'd done it sooner I would've come to my senses a little earlier. Not that it would matter anymore now.

Not that it ever mattered, not to me at least.

Because there was a time, that I thought it wouldn't matter if we got along. She always rubbed me wrong, her arrogance, and general stuck-up attitude made me see red everytime she did something different than the way I wanted.

I always thought it was about me. Not her. Not ever her. Because with her I have this tunnel-vision going. I remember how I walked past her so many times, in the messhall, and after a meeting in the conference-room, without ever really noticing her. Even when she tried one of her half-hearted attempts to engage into small talk, I dismissed her presence.

There was just something, like a cloud inside my head when it came to her. How come I never noticed that before?

Oh and Janeway tried, more times then I can count, to make me see what she herself was seeing. I wonder now who was really to blame. How many times didn't I screw up myself, and just blame it on her, just because it was easier.

And how many times have I caught her watching me from the corner of her eyes, her face devoid of any emotions? Why was it that I could see almost straight through the Captain's command-mask whenever she put it up, but I couldn't see through her facade?

I really didn't bother. Just tolerated her, as much as that was possible, because hey, what was the chance of us ever seeing home again before dying. I thought nothing mattered, and nothing would give my life any value. It would've been nice to go back now, and undo so many of the harm I've done back then.

Sometimes...I thought she was just like a statue. She was always so rigid, and composed. Perhaps if I had taken my sweet time to look behind all of that I could've seen... But why regard her as such, when I wasn't any better myself. I just did my job, be a wife to Tom, lead Engineering, solved some problems here and there...while all the time I was just as much of a shell as her. It all just seems so unworthy now, like being on a never-ending journey, without ever realizing what is happening around you.

I should just blame it all on this tunnel-vision. All I can see is the middle, the happy stuff, the sad stuff just goes to the edges, forgotten as soon as it arrives there. Perhaps that's where the trouble lies, in the years the tunnel has become smaller and smaller. Everything is like that now, all cloudy and small, with not a hint of light in sight.

Perhaps that feeling was never really here to begin with. I'm not sure how to explain it otherwise, the feeling of complete emptyness. Why accuse her of having a heart of ice, while my own is of stone? Why accuse her of not ever showing emotions, while my own were just fake?

I wonder what I'm trying to accomplish. My days are only filled with these hollow thoughts, this set pace that seems to kill me slowly from the inside. I've fooled everyone, including myself, and all I've accomplished is nothing...well almost nothing.

She seems to be truly happy now. Having a life with someone who cares for her, even though I feel she can never be herself with him.  
I wonder...if she's like this deep inside herself. She complained of feeling an outsider, of being alone. And I...I'm surrounded with people, and perhaps even more lonely then she herself has ever been.

All I can see really is the tunnel that will finally collapse on it's own. I've never cared about the edges, about the sadness and hurt, about the feelings she was dealing with.

I'm hiding.

Always have been hiding.

Hiding from the inevitable, before everything will come crashing down.


End file.
